Review: “Fantasyland: A Season on Baseball's Lunatic
Fringe”by Steve Lombardi, for NetShrine.com

Fantasyland: A Season on Baseball's Lunatic Fringe, by Sam Walker, (to be released on
February 16, 2006 by Viking)
is a splendid read. In fact, it is so exceptional that I found myself
devouring it – rather than simply reading it. Each of its 368 pages
leaves the reader with an insatiable desire to read more. Because of this,
Fantasyland
is the type of book that you will not want to put down – until you have read
its last page.

Why
is Fantasyland
this engrossing? Simply put, Walker’s book is frank and full of facts
– as well as being simultaneously witty and charming. No matter what
your preference may be in terms of narrative offerings, you will find it in
Walker’s delivery.

Fantasyland
is Sam Walker’s chronicle of his first rotisserie baseball experience.
However, this is not your everyday fantasy baseball rookie tale. Walker is
a sports columnist for the Wall Street Journal who talked his way into
joining “Tout Wars” (which is a prominent rotisserie “experts” league) for
their 2004 season. Additionally, Sam was armed with a substantial budget
– he spent nearly $20,000 traveling and preparing for the league’s player
auction – and he decided to employ both a Sabermetrician, Sig
Mejdal, and someone who was more focused on the qualitative-side of scouting,
Ferdinando (Nando) Di Fino, to assist him through his rotisserie expedition.
As such, the debate of Sabermetrics versus traditional scouting (and the
balancing of the two schools) is a prevailing thread throughout the book – and
in many ways Fantasyland
is akin to a good buddy-movie in the way that these three characters (Sam, Sig and
Nando) play off each other.

As
a sportswriter, Sam Walker has the access that most fantasy team owners can only
dream about – in that he has a direct connection to players, scouts, coaches
and general managers. As such, in the book, there are many remarkable
stories involving Walker’s roto-related exchanges with current major league
baseball participants such as Jacque Jones, Doug Mientkiewicz, Jose Guillen,
David Oritz, Bill Mueller, Brad Radke, Miguel Batista, Mark Shapiro, Jim
Beattie, Theo Epstein, Dave Littlefield, Billy Beane, Kenny Williams, Lou
Piniella, Alan Trammel, and Mike Scioscia – just to name a few (from a list of
numerous personalities).

Imagine
talking then Devil Rays Manager Lou Piniella into using B.J. Upton as a
Designated Hitter because he’s on your rotisserie team and you need the At
Bats. Walker did it. Imagine e-mailing then Orioles G.M. Jim Beattie
to see if Luis Matos was about to lose his full-time job – and getting a fast
and honest answer. Walker did that as well. Imagine asking Boston
Red Sox slugger David Ortiz if he would trade himself in exchange for Texas
Rangers speedster Alfonso Soriano (because you need steals in the standings) and
then having a debate with him over it. Again, Walker did this. Fantasyland
is full of entertaining and sometimes startling dealings such as these mentioned
here.

Further,
Walker provides an in depth narrative of the genesis and evolution of
rotisserie baseball (in terms of a "game" and an industry) as well as
sharing thorough synopses on the careers of several of the fantasy
pastime’s more notable figures and other prominent baseball information
brokers – including, but not limited to, Bill James, Ron Shandler, Dan Okrent,
Mat Olkin, Joe Sheehan, John Benson, Steve Moyer, Keith Law and Bill Gamson. Shandler is
featured prominently throughout Fantasyland.
As such, I believe that this book will do for him what Moneyball did for Billy
Beane (in both the positive and negative sense).

Lastly,
there are several other amusing anecdotes told in Fantasyland
that I would like to share in this review. However, to do so in any amount
of detail would be somewhat of a spoiler for the reader. Therefore, I will
only disclose a teaser on a few of them. One involves a
"coquettish distraction." Another centers on a stick of
butter. There's one more where the focal object is a six pack of Schaefer
beer. And, there's also a tale of public protest that seems almost too
surreal to be true.

Fantasyland
offers many angles of amusement. As such, because of the robust nature of
the content found in Walker's book, you do not need to be a rotisserie player
to enjoy it. I highly recommend Fantasyland.
It is well worth the retail price of $25.95 (for the hardcover edition).

However,
if you are a former fantasy league player, you should be warned of one possible
outcome as a result of reading this book.

I
fall into that this category. For 12 years (from 1989 through 2000) I
served as a commissioner (and franchise owner) in what many would consider an intense
fantasy baseball league. After a dozen seasons of serving as a fervent
rotisserie den mother, I suffered from severe burnout and quit the game,
cold turkey, following the 2000 campaign. In none of the five years that
have passed since that time did I ever experience any hard feelings of withdrawal -
zip, nada, zilch, nothing. Nevertheless, now, after having read Sam
Walker's book, I have to confess that I am beginning to feel (to draw on a term
that Walker borrows from Dan Okrent in the book) "bereft" of the
game. Reading about the fun in Fantasyland
has stirred the remnants of rotisserie juices in my system. And, I suspect
that other former "players" will have the same reaction when they
finish this book.